Here comes Skynet: Army drones almost ready to share sky with airlines

UAS industry promises to not be evil as domestic drone deadline looms.

On July 5, the US Army announced it had completed a two-week demonstration of a new ground-based sensor system for its MQ-1C Gray Eagle unmanned aerial system (UAS) that will allow UAS operators to detect and avoid other aircraft. The Army is now ready to begin the certification process with the Federal Aviation Administration to allow the Grey Eagle—formerly known as the Warrior—to fly unfettered in domestic airspace. The Army expects to start flying the UASs in domestic airspace for training by March of 2014.

The $90 million Grey Eagle is a descendant of the Predator and manufactured by General Atomics. The aircraft is a medium-range multipurpose UAV that has seen duty in Afghanistan with the Army. In the demonstrations held at the Army’s Dugway Proving Grounds in Utah, the MQ-1C was tested with the Ground Based Sense and Avoid (GBSAA) system, a ground-based radar that monitors the UAV and the aircraft around it.

The GBSAA system will be deployed at five bases around the US where Gray Eagle squadrons will be home-based. Fort Hood, Texas will get the first installation, followed by Fort Riley, Kansas. Fort Stewart in Georgia, Fort Campbell in Kentucky, and Fort Bragg in North Carolina will get their GBSAA systems by 2015.

The Army’s announcement comes as the FAA faces a looming deadline to come up with a plan to integrate unmanned aerial vehicles into its regulations for domestic aircraft. Congress put a mandate into the FAA Modernization and Reform Act, signed in February, that requires the FAA to come up with rules for licensing UAVs to fly in the same airspace as human pilots and complete drones' "integration into the national airspace." Rules for certification of the first civilian UAVs, for use by law enforcement and emergency response agencies, were supposed to be in place by May, with the licenses for these "fast-tracked" drones to be issued starting in August.

Privacy advocates with the American Civil Liberties Union and other organizations have expressed concern about the operation of unmanned aerial systems by government agencies. The fear is that they could easily tread on individuals’ privacy by allowing persistent wide-scale surveillance. In part as a response to these concerns, and as part of an effort to give the FAA a helping hand in accelerating UAV licensing, members of the UAV industry published a voluntary "Code of Conduct" for drone operators and manufacturers on July 5. The Association for Unmanned Vehicle Systems International’s guidelines for "safe, non-intrusive operations" define who should fly UAS and under what circumstances—and include a promise to respect individuals’ privacy.

Divided into sections entitled "Safety," "Professionalism" and "Respect," the guidelines take the form of a pledge—"We will" being the first two words of each guideline. For example: "We will ensure UAS will be piloted by individuals who are properly trained and competent to operate the vehicle of its systems." Under the heading of "Respect," the Code of Conduct makes the following pledges:

We will respect the rights of other users of the airspace.

We will respect the privacy of individuals.

We will respect the concerns of the public as they relate to unmanned aircraft operations.

We will support improving public awareness and education on the operation of UAS.

The Code of Conduct also includes a list of factors that should be incorporated into the risk assessment before operating a UAS.

Promoted Comments

gavron wrote:The operators of these drones do not hold pilot's licenses.

Non-pilots should not be allowed to control or fly aircraft in US airspace. PERIOD.

The Army UAV "pilots" have fewer crashes particularly on landing then the Air Force pilots (trained as pilots of jet aircraft). I do not have the specific quote at hand but it was reported either here or in Wired. (The Army has more UAV pilots with more flying time than the Air Force. The Army program is also cheaper to run.)

The Army pilots typically let the UAV do its own take-off and landings. As a result, fewer crashes.

My own experience running Microsoft Flight Simulator tells me the same thing. You let the machine do the take-off and landing and you'll have fewer crashes.

I somewhat wish that Ars wouldn't mix coverage of the FAA regulations with their coverage of the privacy concerns that UAVs will present. They're really separate issues, with the FAA changes being relatively straightforward.

Edit: Upon rereading the article -- nevermind. Bringing up the FAA regulation changes here is just providing context as to why the drone is getting certified now.

I guess I'm just uneasy that the FAA changes will get dragged into a political quagmire based on privacy issues. The right to fly a drone shouldn't be a controversial issue, so long as they're as safe as any other small aircraft. The right to do surveillance, however, is a whole different matter. Surveillance isn't a UAV's only use, they could be used for everything from firefighting to temporary signal repeaters in remote areas to crop-dusting, to ... well, all sorts of things. Pretty cool things.

We will respect the concerns of the public as they relate to unmanned aircraft operations.

"We will respect" and promptly ignore...

I have a huge trust issue with allowing the government further liberties WRT new surveillance technologies. We've been moving quickly over the past fifteen or so years into a police state and the acceleration is only increasing.

We will respect the concerns of the public as they relate to unmanned aircraft operations.

"We will respect" and promptly ignore...

I have a huge trust issue with allowing the government further liberties WRT new surveillance technologies. We've been moving quickly over the past fifteen or so years into a police state and the acceleration is only increasing.

my trust issues come with the fact that these pledges are not clearly defined. there needs to be a list of clear things that are not be allowed.otherwise "respecting" may mean to not laugh when looking into your windows.

I'm skeptical until someone gives me a legitimate reason as to why we need surveillance drones flying in domestic airspace. And, yes, I'm aware that there are other uses for drones besides surveillance, but you're kidding yourself if you think they're going to be doing anything but 90% of the time. Big Brother hasn't earned my trust on this one...

I'm skeptical until someone gives me a legitimate reason as to why we need surveillance drones flying in domestic airspace. And, yes, I'm aware that there are other uses for drones besides surveillance, but you're kidding yourself if you think they're going to be doing anything but 90% of the time. Big Brother hasn't earned my trust on this one...

You'll be waiting a long time, because there is no legitimate reason. The "terrorists" excuse stopped working a while ago in the minds of sane people.

I trust that the Drone manufacturers will adopt and abide by the code of conduct. Its the official and not so official government agencies that will be doing the actual spying and other inappropriate or inethical acts that are in no way bound by this voluntary code that has me concerned. Over that past several years it has not mattered which administration has been in charge and what their political allegiance is , they have have no problem at all trampling all over privacy rights. Our current admin being one of the worst offenders. I see the ability to deploy these machines domestically as opening the door to wholesale, undocumented inappropriate uses we can only begin to think about. Once enabled it will be a genie that will be very hard to put back into the bottle.

I would love to see one of those flying around on July 4th and see what kind and how much fireworks it would take to bring that sucker down! There could also be celebratory gun fire that just happens to hit one of 'em. A voluntary code of conduct is total BS! Just look at how well it has worked for other companies, like telcos, right up to the point that they decide that they don't want to voluntary follow those rules any more. Make a mandatory cod of conduct followed by step mandatory fines, not some piddly $25k type of fine. Give the rules teeth and a hammer to those who violate it and maybe I would consider UAV's something to have domestically. But until then, they can fuck off! It's bad enough having nosy neighbors and the spying the NSA/FBI already does on us. I'd be down to use them on the boarders launching some missiles at those illegals and narcos. Though with the federal governments track record I wouldn't be surprised to see the DOJ and Obama crying that they unfairly pick on illegal Mexicans and what not.

I don't see the point. Ok, maybe they are safe to fly, but why do we need to fly them in the US? I could see establishing a training area but that doesn't need general clearance and they don't need to be based in five different states. Heck, even if the pilots are based in many states, they still only need to fly in one.

Ultimately they are going to take surveillance data, because that's what you have to do if the goal is to train to take surveillance data.

Its already been proven that these can be co-opted with a higher power signal. How long until one of t hem loses control due to some interference and crashes into a domestic airplane? Or more importantly, how long until someone makes a missile out of one? The weight of the surveilence gear replaced by C4 is enough to bring down any commercial flight. Especially if the terrorists target planes during landing or takeoff where they can use the cover of low altitude and a slow target on a fixed path.

A couple people asked what uses UAVs have beside surveillance. I'm probably not the best one to try to answer, but I'm still going to take a stab at it. =)

First a couple generalities: - Anytime you'd use a regular airplane or helicopter, but you don't really need something that can lift a person. A smaller aircraft can use significantly less fuel. - Anytime you'll want to stay in the air a long time, and the cost of pilots wages becomes significant. Doubly so when you're not doing anything complicated and it'd be boring as hell. - Anytime when you want to do something dangerous, such that there is non-insignificant chance of losing the aircraft. - Eventually, anytime.

A couple specific scenarios. I'm just thinking these up -- someone who has given this serious thought would probably have a better list. Starting with the ones I listed Ina previous post, expanded on a little.

- Cropdusting: Need precise flying, is low to the ground and isn't over a populated area. Cost sensitive, and somewhat dangerous. Seems like an important, and obvious commercial use. - Signal relaying: A small aircraft with a radio repeater could help search and rescue teams in rough terrain, or firefighters in the wilderness. - For Science!: Seriously, if any grad student could purchase an fully autonomous small aircraft (like < 25 lb payload) for a few thousand dollars, then I'm sure they'd find good uses. Remote controlled planes are *hard* to learn how to fly. A fully autonomous craft could be as simple to use as specifying a few waypoints (and registering your flight plan). Tracking radio collared animals, vegitation surveys, monitoring for signs of oil leaks on a pipeline, etc. - Resupply for small towns in the arctic. - Recreational use: C'mon! They're freakin' cool!

Then you have stuff which is more "surveillance" in nature, but not in a creepy spy way. A smaller aircraft which doesn't have to carry a person could make a good replacement TV news or traffic chopper. Monitoring forests for early warning of wildfires. For use in border security. For spotting pirates approaching cruise ships. For catching speeders on freeways.

Then, further out, just about any time when you'd like to fly, but you don't know how. Fully autonomous aircraft are much *simpler* than fully autonomous cars. They'd need to have an extremely high standard of safety, naturally, but the complexity isn't very high.

We will respect the concerns of the public as they relate to unmanned aircraft operations.

"We will respect" and promptly ignore...

I have a huge trust issue with allowing the government further liberties WRT new surveillance technologies. We've been moving quickly over the past fifteen or so years into a police state and the acceleration is only increasing.

Well, it does say for training purposes. At $90 million, I'm guessing most domestic agencies won't be able to afford these, but if I recall correctly, other avenues are available for them. I'm not particularly concerned by this particular develpment and I live a negligable distance from Fort Riley.

We will respect the concerns of the public as they relate to unmanned aircraft operations.

"We will respect" and promptly ignore...

I have a huge trust issue with allowing the government further liberties WRT new surveillance technologies. We've been moving quickly over the past fifteen or so years into a police state and the acceleration is only increasing.

Well, it does say for training purposes. At $90 million, I'm guessing most domestic agencies won't be able to afford these, but if I recall correctly, other avenues are available for them. I'm not particularly concerned by this particular develpment and I live a negligable distance from Fort Riley.

Actually, some cities already have these flying over head 24x7. They get used much as a helicopter would by the police.

I do feel it will improve America's world image if this leads to the occasional US Wedding party getting hit by a cruise missile. At least that will prove these things happen by 'accident'.

As long as they don't arm the drones there's probably nothing to worry about. They may be unmanned but they are guided by some yahoo with a joystick at Fort somethingorother.

I would like to see a flight test though where a Boeing 737 collided with one in mid air. These things are designed to stay in the air a long time so they are probably pretty light. Would the 737 carry on flying?

As someone who is in planes a lot, I have to remind the people operating these things, and their corporate overlords, that we will be fairly well pissed off if they crash one of these bastard robots into an occupied passenger plane.

I don't see the point. Ok, maybe they are safe to fly, but why do we need to fly them in the US? I could see establishing a training area but that doesn't need general clearance and they don't need to be based in five different states. Heck, even if the pilots are based in many states, they still only need to fly in one.

It seems like you do see the point. The point isn't to train the pilots. So if your government want to fly surveillance drones over the population, what do you think they're doing? Perhaps they're watching the citizens?

Unless you're at a runway they're operating off of, you will never see one, so forget all the retarded "shoot them down" fantasies. That class of UAV is quite comfy at a height that it will be impossible to see them with naked eyes.

Further, I find it ridiculously funny that many people trust our .gov with unfettered access to their medical records, but get wound up over a camera with wings. Awesome.

Non-pilots should not be allowed to control or fly aircraft in US airspace. PERIOD.

Ehud(Private Pilot - Rotorcraft)

Completely untrue. All of the military services currently require their RPV/UAV operators to be licensed pilots, either military or civilian. This is particularly important for the General Atomics Predator-based systems, as they are much more RPVs (remotely piloted vehicles) that require stick-and-rudder skills, than UAVs (unmanned aerial vehicles), that the operator interacts with at what would be called the autopilot level in a manned system.

For example, all of the Northrop Grumman UAVs perform fully autonomous takeoff and landing, and in fact it is impossible to manually control the aircraft during these phases of flight. This is a Good Thing - look up how many Predator accidents occur during landing, for example, where the aircraft is under pretty much direct stick-and-rudder control from the operator on the ground.

To be fair to the US Government if they wanted to fly Spy Drones over your houses, more than likely they are already doing it. I personally think that UAV's (Civilian ones) outfitted for jobs like firespotting could be immensely beneficial on the whole.

gavron wrote:The operators of these drones do not hold pilot's licenses.

Non-pilots should not be allowed to control or fly aircraft in US airspace. PERIOD.

The Army UAV "pilots" have fewer crashes particularly on landing then the Air Force pilots (trained as pilots of jet aircraft). I do not have the specific quote at hand but it was reported either here or in Wired. (The Army has more UAV pilots with more flying time than the Air Force. The Army program is also cheaper to run.)

The Army pilots typically let the UAV do its own take-off and landings. As a result, fewer crashes.

My own experience running Microsoft Flight Simulator tells me the same thing. You let the machine do the take-off and landing and you'll have fewer crashes.

Sean Gallagher / Sean is Ars Technica's IT Editor. A former Navy officer, systems administrator, and network systems integrator with 20 years of IT journalism experience, he lives and works in Baltimore, Maryland.